


Meet the Neighbors

by undercover_chicken



Category: Transformers - All Media Types, Transformers: Prime
Genre: Also he loses a body part, Electrocution, Gen, Mythical Beings & Creatures, aka Ratchet gets zapped but is ok (sort of), but its minor and temporary
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-01-11
Updated: 2017-01-08
Packaged: 2018-05-13 05:04:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 8,643
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5696065
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/undercover_chicken/pseuds/undercover_chicken
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Being struck by lightning wasn't on Ratchet's to-do list. Turns out that the Autobots and their human friends aren't alone in Outpost Omega One. The problem: these neighbors were here first, and only Ratchet can see them. And they want the Autobots gone.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

It was once a cave. Native Americans had often camped here, saying that the butte and its sister were the spirits, watching over them. The great Thunderbird was said to make his nest here, and Kokopelli and Coyote were said to often come to work their mischief in this place. Later, the white man would come in the late nineteenth century, and drive the natives away. They said that the rock formation and one of its sisters resembled a giant pair of mittens. The cave served as shelter from the great heat of the desert to many travelers as they headed west, hoping to strike it rich in the gold mines of California. It was somewhat forgotten until the mid twentieth century, when someone looked to the cave and said that it would make a great place for the deployment of missiles to protect the nation against its greatest enemy. The eighties came and went, and the Berlin Wall fell. The USSR disintegrated, and with it, the Cold War ended. The missile silo, like many others of its kind, was surplus and considered obsolete. Its personnel were moved and its contents removed. It sat unused for twenty years until someone looked to the cave once again. This time, it was its walls that were impermeable to radio waves, and the large, tall hallways that attracted attention. It was the perfect place for the race of tall, mechanized, alien visitors who had brought their war to the humans' planet. The base was hastily "cleaned" and presented to the Cybertornians, whose leader deemed it satisfactory. It became Autobot Outpost Omega One, and once again, the cave sheltered people. The only problem was that the extraterrestrial visitors were not the only ones who called this place home.

  
Ratchet hated the place. Everything in it was secondhand, passed down, with unwanted and outdated equipment. The newest human computer systems in the base were from the late eighties and early nineties, and it had taken a lot of work to update and integrate them with the Cybertronian components. The end result was a glitchy, touchy system that crashed at least twice a day. It seemed that for every glitch or problem he fixed, another five appeared to take its place. The base was musty, dusty, and moldy, which irritated intakes and clogged air filters, which Ratchet had to take care of, being the team's only medic. The washracks that had been installed for the Cybertronians worked only when they felt like it, and most of the time, the water came out a dirty brown color from rusted pipes and smelling like the inside of a human sewer. Organic vermin infested the base-spiders and rodents were in every corner, and gnawed on wires and got into the energon stocks. Dead rats could often be found floating in uncovered or partially covered energon cubes, and one decomposing body would render an entire cube useless, which was not just an inconvenience, but a disaster to the energon-strapped Autobots, who didn't have enough to start with . Primus only knew how they got there.

  
Other, stranger occurrences would happen. Tools or other items would go missing and maybe turn up later in strange places; computers glitch, machinery malfunction, or fuses blow for no reason; mysterious power surges or outages with no known or traceable cause; strange noises and voices that would come from the depths of the base that had no discernible source; or the strange thunderstorms that would strike the base when there had not been a cloud in the sky moments before.

  
Ratchet had more experience with this phenomenon than the other Autobots. He was often fixing new problems that cropped up or operating the groundbridge, which led to him spending extended amounts of time in the base alone, especially while the others were on patrol and the children were in school. It was on one such day that Ratchet could be found on the top of the silo, replacing and fixing the proximity sensors that were located upon the top of the butte the base was located in. They had malfunctioned for the umpteenth time, which had led to a surprise and very unwelcome visit from Agent Fowler, who was angry at Prime for "pancaking a mini-mall" yet again.

  
Ratchet snorted as he worked. The irritating agent didn't seem to realize how many lives had been saved that day. So far, none of Team Prime had accidently stepped on or damaged any of the fragile organics that called this planet home, and all the human could do was complain about property damage. Humans seemed to take for granted that Team Prime would protect them from the 'Cons, and treated the Autobots like they were the unwelcome intruders. The resources they allowed the Autobots were secondhand junk, and even the junk was handed out in a miserly manner. "Ungrateful wretches," Ratched muttered angrily. One of the sensors he had just replaced abruptly sparked, and then blew out, giving off a small trail of smoke. "Of all the.....!" Ratchet snarled. The sensor was brand new, and now he had to replace it again. This sensor was located on the far side of the butte, next to the small spire of rock that formed the "thumb" of the butte's mitten shape. The spire had a large, saucer-shaped divet in the top, almost like the nest of some giant bird, as Miko had once commented.

  
As he hiked back over to replace the faulty sensor, it abruptly started to drizzle. "Stupid organic planet with its unpredictable weather. Why can't the humans develop the technology to control it?" Ratchet griped to himself. "We're in the middle of a Primus-forsaken desert anyway. Why is it even raining?" Thunder rumbled ominously in the distance. A strong wind gusted over the top of the butte, almost knocking the unfortunate mech off. The rain began to come down harder, and the thunder was almost deafening. Ratchet hunched over the faulty sensor. "It's always something, and always me having to fix it. Things never go wrong for anyone else, and if they do, it's me having to fix it because I'm the only one who knows how." So immersed in feeling sorry for himself, Ratchet never noticed the immense shadow of the pitch black cloud that fell over him. He did notice when the lightning struck him.

  
Ratchet could not see, hear, or do anything as his body jerked in spasms from the electricity and all of his systems sent back warnings and failures that scrolled by his optics. Massive electrical overloads on all the systems, more than could be safely routed by the natural biology of his frame, ravaged his body. The emergency backups did the only thing that could be done: they shut down everything to protect the delicate circuitry and Ratchet fell offline.

  
The first thing he thought as he came back online was that being on top of one of the tallest natural formations in the area coupled with the fact that he was metal during a thunderstorm was probably not the smartest idea that he had ever had. The second thought was that he was lucky no one had been around to see him make such a stupid mistake. All systems seemed to be okay, which meant the backup systems had done the right thing in shutting him down. They were booting up one by one, running through various checks. Audials were one of the last systems to come online, and when they did, Ratchet could hear voices. Scrap, he thought. It would appear he had been out longer that he had thought, and the others had come back from patrol to find him passed out on top of the butte. Optical systems came online next, and Ratchet opened his optics. The sight that greeted him made him freeze in terror.

  
Two enormous birds, ones of such a size that could eat Optimus and Team Prime for lunch and probably have Megatron and Starscream for dessert, sat conversing with each other not but a few feet away from him. Wicked, curved beaks and sharp talons made them appear to be some sort of giant raptor, but one such as Ratchet had never seen. One was standing over two chicks that were in the saucer-shaped divet on the "thumb." _Odd_ , Ratchet thought. I _could have sworn by the Allspark that those younglings were not there a few moments ago._ The two young birds didn't appear to be capable of flight yet, which only deepened the mystery. How had they gotten there? Had the parents carried them there while he was out? _Highly unlikely, but the most plausible explanation. I would have noticed if they were there before. I've been up here, what, a hundred times over the last human year? I would have seen them._

  
As his systems booted up fully, Ratchet moved ever so slightly to a more comfortable position. Immediately, the two birds swung their heads around to look at him, and hissed angrily. He immediately froze. Ratchet watched in disbelief as electricity seemed to gather around the wings of the smaller raptor. The bird lifted its wings, and then brought them down in a sweeping motion towards Ratchet. Thunder boomed and lighting shot towards the unfortunate 'bot. "Scrap," Ratchet muttered right before the lightning hit him a second time that day and knocked him offline yet again.

* * *

  
"Ratchet." A deep voice sounded in his audials. "RATCHET." The voice sounded again, and groggily, Ratchet realized it was Optimus Prime speaking to him. "Unnngh," was the only sound he could manage in return. He opened his optics, and sat up. Somehow he had ended up at the base of the butte. "Why are you lying out in the open old friend?" Optimus asked.

  
"I'm not sure...I was up on the top replacing proximity sensors when one of those storms cropped up. All I remember was getting hit by lightning. I must have fallen off..." Ratchet trailed off. He thought about mentioning the birds, but decided they must have been a hallucination brought on by being struck by lightning.

  
"Are you all right?" Optimus looked at him in concern. Falling several stories off a butte and being struck by lightning would damage even the toughest Cybertronian.

  
Ratchet was about to answer when Arcee rolled by in her motorcycle form. "I understand that we're strapped for parts and you're devoted to the Cause Ratchet, but acting as the lightning rod that you mentioned we needed to protect the equipment is a little extreme."

  
Ratchet seethed as the kids and the rest of the team laughed as they went further into the base. "Hey, don't take it personally, Docbot. Who knows, maybe being zapped and falling on your head fixed your 'I'm perpetually grumpy' glitch!" Miko chimed in, which made everyone laugh even more. Why she enjoyed baiting him Ratchet couldn't even begin to fathom, and being who he was, he just couldn't let it go. Trying to ignore Miko was also futile. He still didn't understand how the others could put up with her.  
"I'm going to go fix the groundbridge," he snarled and made to stalk off, but was stopped when Optimus laid a hand upon his shoulder. "Perhaps a rest would be more in order, old friend. After all," Optimus said with the barest hint of a smile, "it is not every day that our medic decides to emulate a Seeker."

  
Ratchet snarled to himself even more. Even Prime was laughing at him. He moved angrily towards his quarters. As he stomped down the corridors, he heard someone screech, "Watch where you're putting your great clumsy feet, you stupid oaf! "

  
Ratchet nearly jumped through the low ceiling. At his feet, two small, serpent-like creatures with horns glared at him. "What in the Allspark..." he trailed off as the creatures continued on their way. "Why do I even bother?" one snarled. "It's not like those stupid great celestial morons can hear or see me anyway. I'll have to ask Koko or Coyote if they can slip more rats into that blue liquid poison that they drink. Maybe that will make them leave...."

  
"The thunderbirds nearly had that one find their nest this morning. It almost crushed their chicks," the other commented. "Toarrk got it but good, and twice too. The only problem was it lived."

  
" Too bad it survived when they zapped the crap out of it-I would have thought that would have finished the wretch, being made of metal and all," the first one answered. " Maybe Unhcegila will have some better ideas on how to get rid of the pests when we get together for the monthly community meet."

  
"Yes, but I will admit that it is nice to have humans in the caves again though. And not those ones who were always scurrying around talking about killing the others too. Young ones who really bring the place to life. It reminds me of the old days, when the old humans would camp here and we would hear stories and songs and such. It's the only decent thing those star travelers have brought here."

  
"Oh yes, I will give them some credit for that," the first horned snake replied. "But the fact of the matter remains that they do not belong on this world, and we must do what we can to evict them from our home, even if it means losing the humans. By the way, which one did Toarrk get?"

  
"The angry red and white one, the one that always runs around the cave fiddling with things and cursing and complaining about everything upon our world."

  
"Excellent!" the first snake crowed. "That one deserves it. It is so irritating to listen to, and it is always poking its nonexistent nose where it doesn't need to go. Siessa had to move the hatchlings again just the other day because it nearly discovered our nest yet again.

  
"One thing I don't understand though," the first snake continued, "if the creature hates our world so much and yearns for its own, why doesn't it just return there and leave us alone?"

  
"Beats me," snake number two replied. Ratchet watched speechlessly as the two creatures slid into a grate near the floor and disappeared from sight.  
"Alright Ratchet, it's just a hallucination brought on by falling on your head and getting zapped from that storm. A little bit of recharge and you'll be fine in the morning," he told himself as he staggered into his quarters. Ratchet quickly locked the door and dropped a crate over the grate in the floor though. Just to be safe of course, he silently told himself. Even if the creatures don't exist, which they most certainly don't, it never hurts to be prepared. He fell into recharge with a wrench in hand, ready to smack anything that dared touch him while he was out.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> More torture for poor Ratchet ahead. Creatures that appear are loosely based on several Native American myths, but please understand that I have taken a lot of creative license with them, and they will most likely not resemble their original mythos much at all.

Two human weeks later and the visions of the strange creatures had not faded. Unfortunately for Ratchet, they seemed to have increased. The "horned snakes," as he had dubbed them for lack of a better name, seemed to be ubiquitous. They were literally everywhere, getting into everything and hissing at him and the other 'bots as they passed. Both the humans and the other 'bots seemed to completely oblivious to them though, and Ratchet afraid to mention anything about any of it. The others would either think he was losing his processor or laugh at him. Knowing Miko, it would probably be both, and she would most likely throw in a snarky comment about how he was feeling his age. 

Other, stranger creatures were scattered throughout the base. And all of them seemed to dislike Ratchet and his fellow Cybertonians. They would hiss and make other noises of discontent as the 'bots would pass through the hallways, and would often make rude comments. Ratchet himself had endured quite a few insulting catcalls as he moved about the base fixing things. The most common insults directed his way included his weight, which he surmised was from his rather heavyset build compared to the others, to his hygienic habits, and the hygienic habits, appearance, and intelligence of his parental figures. He did have to snigger at the comments directed towards Prime. Optimus did have a rather, ahem, feminine figure.

The odd thing was that the creatures didn't seem to realize that he could see them. The more he thought about it, he supposed that it could be because he had given them no real indication that he could, but he would have thought that by his reactions they might have realized that he was able to perceive them.

Today, Ratchet was making some modifications to the groundbridge. He was digging through the internals of the machinery, trying to ignore some of the horned snakes as they skittered out of his way while he stripped out more equipment from the groundbridge internals. They slithered over his pedes and Ratchet tried to keep from shuddering from the feeling. It was uncomfortably reminiscent of the time that one of the medical students back at the University that he had taught at before the war thought it would be funny to drop some glitch mice in his armor during a lecture. 

The relative peace was abruptly shattered as Bumblebee and Bulkhead came roaring in, followed seconds later by Arcee, and they discharged their yammering, annoying passengers. The young humans gave a cursory, half-hearted greeting to Ratchet and then immediately moved towards the "Human Corner" of the base and set up to play one of their irritating and noisy games. From the sound of it, it was the car racing game. Strange, Ratchet thought absently to himself, that for a species with such a short attention span, that such a boring and repetitive exercise could hold their attention for so long. Especially the two younger ones. I would have thought that they would have tired of that game within a day. Quite frankly, he couldn't see the appeal to the game, which was two cars racing side by side on a relatively straight track, but it kept both the children and Bumblebee engaged and not bothering him.

Today though, it was the loud cheers and whoops that attracted his attention. Usually the children didn't get that into the game. Looking up, he noted that both Arcee and Bulkhead didn't seem to be paying attention to the game. Turning to look at the game setup, he realized that there was a veritable horde of small, feathered, owl-like creatures perched all over the humans' area, ones that he had caught glimpses of around the base. They were on the back of the nasty old couch, the railing that kept wayward organics from becoming an oily splat on the concrete floor, and the old door on concrete blocks that served as a "table." Some of them were even perched on the shoulders of Jack and Miko, and one was firmly installed on Raf's head. They resembled oversized Barn owls, about two and half feet tall, with extremely long legs and arms with hands on the ends as well as small wings. They were the ones who were making so much noise, and they appeared to be just as engaged by the racing game as the humans were. There was also a conspicuous absence of them around Bumblebee.

****

A week later and the "peanut gallery" had not only stayed, it had increased in size, volume, and sheer irritating ability. The audience that the humans seemed to attract was immense, and the small creatures tended to follow the children around base. Ratchet eyed the creatures angrily. "Stupid organics," he snarled. "Don't know when to shut up. When will this misery end?" He was still hanging onto the thin hope that the visions of the creatures would fade, but that hope was fading with each passing day. Even after twenty-seven processor scans and various other tests, he could find nothing wrong with himself, and the visions continued. 

At least he had figured out what was happening to his tools. The small owl-things appeared to be kleptomaniac. They would go for anything shiny, and would often take off with all of his metal tools. He had also witnessed some of the horned snakes, and some sort of strange, ephemeral hawk-looking things stealing various other objects, sometimes even brazenly venturing out in plain sight during the day. The tools would usually show up again in odd or inconvenient places. Just last week a crowbar had gone missing, and had showed up again rammed in Bumblebee's shoulder. Poor 'Bee hadn't even known it was there until he tried to transform into his car form and ended up stuck halfway. It was a very uncomfortable, embarrassing, and time-consuming task to get him unstuck, and by the time he was done untangling the mess, Ratchet was ready to shoot or smash any of the creatures that got too close to his feet. Unfortunately, they seemed to intuit his intentions and stayed well away from him for several days, well out of squishing range.  
The other 'bots didn't seem to lose nearly as much of their stuff as he did. At first he surmised it was just because he had more things, being in charge of the medbay and tinkering around all the time like he did. It was only after he recalled the conversation between the two horned snakes on that first day that he began to think differently. The little organics seemed to take an unholy glee in making his day-to-day life a misery. 

He had also discovered one of the reasons the computers were so glitchy. The horned snakes seemed to enjoy the heat the computer equipment gave off, and every time he took a panel off of something, they would come scurrying out. Ratchet had a sneaking suspicion that the small creatures also probably messed with the wiring in the base, and he felt his hunch was confirmed when he found small teeth marks on the wiring of some of the leads heading towards the main computer that he had replaced not but a week prior. 

The small inhabitants of the base were not the only ones present. There were other, larger creatures that inhabited both the inside and outside of the butte, and the area around it. There were the strange human-like ones, like family of flying deer-headed eagle men and women that lived in the cave high up the side of the butte. They had deer heads and wings and feet like raptors, but the body and arms of humans. There appeared to be seven of them, a pair with their three children, a female grandparent, and the mate of the eldest offspring, who was fully grown. There were also several pairs of humanoids with the lower legs of some sort of antelope and what appeared to be horns that could often be seen leaping from rock to rock on both their butte and the neighboring ones or jogging across the desert sands. There were also coyote-like creatures that would run on all fours but could occasionally be seen walking in a bipedular manner and who appeared to possess human-like hands. Unlike the smaller ones who inhabited the inside of the base, these seemed rather benevolent. They still acted standoffish and scared when the Cybertronians came near, but they didn't seem as meddlesome as the smaller creatures. These seemed content to mind their own business and make no trouble, but they were no happier about the 'bots being in the area then the rest of the creatures.

By far, the worst were the large birds. There was the pair that lived on top of their butte that had shocked the living daylights out of him twice that day. There was also a pair nesting on the opposite butte, but of a different variety. These, thank Primus, were unable to generate the lightning and storms that their cousins were, but they were not without dangerous weaponry. Ratchet had discovered this the hard way when he had climbed up to the top of their butte. The idea was that since the lightning birds were on the top of the base, he could put proximity sensors on the other butte and not bother the angry, dangerous parent birds, and therefore avoid being zapped.

Unfortunately, Ratchet had not realized that this butte also had a pair of oversized raptors nesting on it. Turns out that these didn't shoot lightning, but they were able to "sling" the large feathers on their wings at intruders. The feathers turned as hard as stone when they left the bird's body, and were deadly sharp. It didn't help matters that the birds were extremely accurate in how they threw the feathers, and the fact that they released a veritable storm of them. The feathers also had the added benefit of shattering into a thousand little shards upon impact with the ground that were just as sharp as the feathers and twice as bad . The unfortunate medic had barely had time to turn and run away as fast as he possibly could.

Turns out you can't run very far on a butte without falling off. Ratchet managed to catch himself before he got too far down the side of the butte, but it was a long way down, especially since splinters from the shattered feathers had hit him and worked their way into all of his joints. He walked back to base because it was far too painful to transform, and spent the rest of the day picking the shards out of his armor and joints. And he still hadn't gotten all of them out.

****

It was because of the stone-slinging birds that Ratchet again found himself one morning on top of the base trying to fix the proximity sensors. They were far more territorial than the lightning birds. As long as Ratchet stayed on the opposite side of the butte, the lightning birds ignored him. If he crossed the "invisible line" and ventured too close to their chicks, they would get riled up, and he immediately backed off. As a result, the west side of the base had a greater concentration of the sensors. It made the sensing systems less accurate, but it worked, and had the added bonus of making the maintenance safer and zap free, as well as keeping both parties happy.

It was already topping out in the upper nineties, and the sun was beating down on Ratchet mercilessly. The air was completely still, with not even a small breeze to dispel the oppressive heat. He crouched over the malfunctioning sensors, grousing to himself about the various environmental conditions, and the fact that there were still some slivers buried in his backside courtesy of the stone-slinging birds that he had been unable to get out. He attempted to coax a favorable response out of the sensory system.

Today though, the stubborn system was just not in a mood to cooperate. Finally slinging the tool he was holding into his toolkit with a muffled curse, Ratchet snarled, "Fine! Stay broken! If Optimus wants to know if Fowler is going to drop in, he can just fix the fragging thing himself! I quit! Let's see, groundbridge still needs maintenance, the electrical system is fritzing, and the main computer is glitching again....Why is it for every thing I fix, three other things screw up?" 

Three hours later, and Ratchet was in a worse mood than when he had started. Nothing he had attempted to fix was in any better shape than when he had started. He decided to try and catch up on some recharge, but the chittering of the owl creatures kept him up for hours. Finally falling into recharge, he was awakened by a scraplet gnawing at one of his legs. Some of the vermin still infested the base, despite their best efforts, and they seemed to be reproducing. No one was sure how the scraplets had not infested the entire base, or what was controlling their numbers, but as the humans say, you don't look a gift horse in the mouth. 

With a muffled curse, Ratchet snagged the nearest tool, a wrench, and brought it down on the unfortunate creature's helm. The scraplet fell off of his leg, staggered drunkenly a moment, and then toppled off the edge of the berth, with its sense of equilibrium completely shot and a severely dented helm. It continued to stagger around the room like an inebriated drunk, while Ratchet quickly scanned the room for something heavy enough to turn it into a scraplet pancake.

The crate he had dropped over the grate to keep out the snakes seemed to fit the bill, and Ratchet snagged it and turned, only to gape in astonishment as one of the little owl-things finished disemboweling what remained of the scraplet, which it had obviously deactivated. It chirped once, and then ate what remained of the wretched vermin. It then snagged a second, more unfortunate scraplet and took it up to feed to its nest of chicks, alive. Ratchet stared in horrified fascination-he had, over the course of the last few weeks, deduced that the small owl-things could and would eat absolutely anything, including non-organic compounds and metal, but it hadn't occurred to him that the little creatures would eat a scraplet. "I guess that's why we haven't had a problem with the scraplet infestation," he muttered to himself. Unable to fall back into recharge after watching the voracious little predator and its young, he decided to go and see if he could fight the evil washrack long enough to get a decent shower.

Today, the washrack seemed to be cooperating, and clean, non-odorous water flowed out of the pipes. At least something is going right today! he thought. Humming to himself, Ratchet stepped out of the shower to locate the ever elusive scrub brush that migrated around the washroom. He found it after about ten minutes of searching instead of the usual twenty, stepped back into the shower, and turned.

A minute later he was running down the hallway screaming in terror. 

There was apparently a giant Predacon-like organic as big as Prime living in the washrack drain. Somehow, defying all physics, it had come up out of the drain and was enjoying the spray of water, presumably while he had been looking for the scrub brush. Ratchet wasn't sure who had been more terrified, him or the monster, as he had screamed and it had given a bellow of terror before diving back into the too-small drain.

Ratchet sat on a crate, trembling as he tried to get over the terror while clutching the scrub brush to himself like a child would a stuffed animal. He didn't even notice that he was still dripping wet and the water was running all over the floor and into the banks of computer terminals and power converters. With a fizzling, popping noise, the power in the base abruptly went out and everything was plunged into darkness. 

It was too much for the already traumatized Ratchet. He took off and ended up outside the base. "Primus, I can't take this anymore!" he all but shrieked. A loud cry made him look up. One of the lightning birds was returning to it nest. "@#$@ you!" he yelled at it. "If you hadn't freakin' zapped me, none of this would have happened..."  
Ratchet trailed off as realization struck him. All of the visions of the freakish creatures had been AFTER he had been struck by the creature's lightning. Maybe it could work the other way around...

Five minutes later, he was striding across the top of the butte straight towards the nest, only to realize that neither one of the adults were there. "Scrap." The only thing on top of the butte besides him were the two wide-eyed chicks as they gawked at him. Ratchet lost what little control over his sanity he had left and began to rant and rave as the two younglings stared at the crazy metal man who seemed to have lost its mind. One of them looked up. "Oh good, Momma's home!" it chirped happily. Ratchet was cut off mid-rant as he was hit with enough voltage to power a small factory.

He woke with a groan. As his optics came into focus, he realized he was staring at two extremely large and deadly looking bird feet. Twisting his helm around slightly, he came face-to-face with two extremely pissed off parent birds. It looked like he was going to suffer the same fate as the unlucky scraplets from earlier. "Well, that didn't work..."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Creatures that show up in this chapter (and as for any mistakes, we all know the internet never lies):   
> Achiyalatopa-bird that flings "stone knives" at its enemies; I modified it by making it throw feathers (albeit dangerous ones!); originally from the Zuni tribe.  
> Avanyu-horned serpents, as mentioned in last chapter.  
> Chickcharney-little "owl men" from the southeast tribes who are said to be mischievous spirits; their description in this story is merely me taking creative license.  
> Cetan-hawk spirit (these are the "ephemeral hawks") from the Sioux tribe.  
> Pamola-these are the deer-headed eagle people from the Abenaki tribe.  
> Adlet-the coyote people. Originally a humanoid wolf from the arctic tribes, but you don't see many wolves in the desert...mostly coyotes.  
> The antelope people don't really have a name other than "Deer People" and they come from the Great Plains tribes. As for the water dragon, his name was given in the last chapter, and I'm too lazy to type out the full name, and he is also Sioux.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Amazing! I'm not dead! Here, have a chapter!

“Many-cursssed-starrrr-thing isss awake, Toarkkkk. Get rrrrrrid beforrrrre it hurrrrts chickssss,” the larger of the two birds shrieked at the smaller one. The smaller bird looked rather harried and put upon as the larger one continued screaming at it in the same vein. It took Ratchet a minute but he was able to start picking out words from the shrieking, screaming mess that was spewing out of the larger bird’s beak. The smaller (but still enormous) bird seemed to be trying to reason with the larger, but wasn’t able to get a word (or screech) in edgewise. Ratchet came to the conclusion that the larger bird was the female, as she(?) had a higher pitched voice, and he dimly remember Miko mentioning something about how male raptors tended to be smaller than females. Miko had gone through a phase where she was utterly obsessed with owls for some obscure reason, and would talk incessantly about them for hours, which then had branched out into other birds of prey. Something about “how cool” they were since they were equipped with the equivalent of large swords on their feet and face, and killed stuff with lots of blood and gore, had appealed to her. It had gotten to the point where he would set up a separate processing thread just to run to catalogue what she was saying and run an automated verbal response so he could get some work done, and then just dump the info into his memory banks later when he was recharging. He had never gotten around to deleting it even though he considered it useless information, and for once in his very long life, he was glad to have had Miko around for once.

He attempted to sneakily crawl away, but his limbs and joints were responding sluggishly to the commands his processor was sending them, which was understandable since everything had just been fried twice in a row with several thousand volts of electricity. His blasted shoulder joint creaked, just like it always did, but at the worst possible time. Both birds snapped their heads around to look at him.

“SSSee, hasss not died! You fail, not kill,” the female (?) shrieked at its mate. “Isss ssstill alive, and ssstill threat!”

“Irrrla…” the male(?) began to say, but was cut off by the female (which Ratchet had cataloged the larger bird as in his processor), who began to shriek “Thrrreat, Toarrrk! Kill blasssted thing!”

The put-upon male replied angrily “So much thrrreat, you kill inssstead!”

The female then replied in the vein that the male had failed in his job as a mate to her, and then the male replied that it was her job to defend the nest itself, whilst he defended it from afar. She then replied that she should have chosen another as her mate, which set the male off in an apoplectic rage. They danced about the top of the butte, shrieking at each other, hopping back and forth around the butte as they raised and lowered the crests of feathers on their heads and flared and folded their wings. Ratchet was strongly reminded of when he had visited Vos once upon a time, back before the war, and had witnessed a fight between two brightly colored, bonded Seekers in the middle of a crowded street who were both furious at each other for some unspecified reason. It had been a bunch of dancing around each other and posturing just as these two had done. The ridiculousness of the situation and similarity of the birds to the Seekers coupled with the stress of the situation caused him to start laughing, and once he started, he couldn’t stop. The birds were looking at him, having frozen about halfway through their dancing performance, which caused him to laugh even harder. They cocked their heads in confusion, and looked at each other, somewhat lost. The larger female seemed to recover first.

“We kill you, tressspasssser! Nowherrrre to run!” she screamed at him, puffing up her feathers to make herself look bigger in a way reminiscent of Seekers.

“Can’t run,” Ratchet replied.

The female puffed up even further in both pride and righteous rage, if it was possible. “Yessss, you frrrrozzen in fearrr, we superrriorrr! You at ourrrr merrrcy!” she crowed.

“No, you just fried all my circuits. I’m stuck here-I couldn’t move even if I wanted to,” Ratchet replied laconically. A stray giggle escaped him as the bird puffed up even more.

The bird hissed angrily, “Why you not afrrraid? I thrrrreaten you!”

“Ehhhh-he-he, no reason. It’s not like I’m just seeing all sorts of weird slag ever since one of you idiots zapped me that first time. No weird snake things with horns, no ghost birds, nothing. I’m not trying to tell myself I’m having a processer malfunction when you lot zap the living scrap out of me and when I’m still pulling out those feather blade things those other wretches on the other butte shot me with in the aft the other week. Nope, nothing at all, and I’m sure you’re not to blame,” Ratchet said rather giddly. He was still running off a slight high from the charge that was tingling around his frame, which felt rather like having a nice bit of high grade now that he thought about it. Well, maybe a lot. A lot a lot. He couldn’t even sit up, and his processor was making him feel silly and laugh at the stupidest things.

The smaller male was slowly turning to look at its mate, who feathers had slicked down so fast that it looked like it had dropped several thousand pounds. “Irrrla, what it talking about? I hit it with enough of light-that-ssstrrrikess should be dead, twice! Now thinking about it, ssshould not ssssee usss or chickssss…”

The bird turned and snarled, “I do nothing, Toarrrk! I just blassst it with warrrning light-that-ssstrikesss the firrrrssst time it wasss at nessst! You know, sscarrrre away frrrom nessst!”

The male, whose name appeared to be Toark, snapped and poofed up angrily, “No wonderrr it not dead! You not hit harrrrd enough with light-that-ssstrrikess firrrrst time to kill it, and now it immune! We unable to kill it! It will tell otherrrs, and they thrrreaten chicks! Also put all otherrrs-who-dwell-herrre at rrrisssk! All yourrrr fault!”

“Not my fault!” the other bird screamed back, poofing as well. “You ssshould have gotten rrrid of it firrrst day it herrrre, but you say, ‘no, it not thrrrreat,” and ignorrrre it and otherrrsss! It yourrrr fault!”

The birds immediately went back to arguing as they had been doing before. The ground was shaking slightly under their large feet as they hopped about, dancing angrily around each other while shrieking. The tremors helped clear Ratchet’s helm and dispel enough of the charge that he could finally sit up and think with a somewhat clear processor. The noise was even worse than that of the children at their loudest, and he muttered, “Do these two ever stop?”

One of the chicks chirped quite happily, “Nope, Momma and Dadda alwaysss loud and dancsssing.”

Ratchet just groaned and dropped back down on his back, slamming his helm back onto the red sandstone. One living hell to another. Figures.

 

* * *

 

Four hours later and the birds were still going at it, with no signs of stopping. Ratchet had long before just simply turned his audials down to the lowest setting in a futile attempt to drown out the noise. He was actually beginning to drop into a light recharge, when a horrible scream echoed over the landscape, jerking him immediately back to full awareness. Both birds immediately stopped their arguing, looking towards the west and beginning to hiss with the fury of Seekers who young sparklings were being threatened. It was odd, Ratchet reflected, on how similar these two were in body language and mannerisms to the old Seekers of Vos, and he wondered idly how the seekers would have reacted to them. Seekers had always been proud, and to see these large organics that could easily eat them for lunch and call up such powerful storms would have certainly knocked a few of the most arrogant ones he had wanted to deck in the face with a fist back in those days down a few pegs.

On the upside, whatever paralysis or overcharged effects he had been suffering from before were now gone, and he had a clear processor. A few simple but sly movements also confirmed his motor functions had all returned as well. He figured that he could make a break for the top entrance to the missile silo when the birds were distracted while they dealt with whatever it was that was making them so angry. The birds tensed, and then took to the skies towards one of the small dust storms that were so frequent in the region.

They screamed in rage and defiance, and were answered by the razor-feather slingers on the other butte, who also took to the skies. Toark and Irrla began spinning in circles, as they began to call up a large storm. The other two large birds were screaming, and Ratchet could see the large feathers they were lining up ready to start slinging. As good as a time as any to get a move on, Ratchet didn’t want to hang around to meet whatever baddie had gotten the birds so riled. He began to turn to make his way across the butte, when he looked over and saw the three chicks huddled in the nest together, their eyes wide with terror.

Horrible screams were beginning to echo across the landscape, as the dust storm moved even closer. If he squinted, Ratchet could almost make out shapes in the dust, but he was unsure. The three young birds whimpered in fear. Feeling a flash of guilt for seeing any youngling of any species filled with such terror, he asked “What’s wrong?”

“They come!” one of the small ones cried.

“Who is ‘they’?” Ratchet snapped, his patience running thin.

“Piasssa!” the young one shrilled in terror.

“Paisa? What in the Pit is…” but his words were cut off as the mother of all screams sounded right above them. Looking up, Ratchet beheld something out of his worst recharge fluxes. A monster was hovering above them, a creature with a body roughly in the shape of an earth animal known as a horse but two times the size of the enormous birds, and covered in what he assumed to be scales but were large and thick enough to rival the thickest Cybertronian armor. Not even the toughest tanks could come close. A massive, powerful, curling tail ended in spikes that could easily pierce armor, and legs ended in spiked talons that could do the same. Horns that could be considered close to a deer’s but much more curled and tortured looking sat over red eyes that gleamed with a terrible glee and a mouth set up with a nasty underbite and massive fangs that protruded upwards like tusks. Smoke drifted out of the mouth, and Ratchet could see the glow of a fire within the nostrils.

So _that_ was a Piasa.

The horrible creature’s smug look turned to rage when one of the birds slung some of its razor-feathers into its face. Many of them clattered off its armor-like scales, but a few got caught in the spaces between, which seemed to irritate the creature. It took off after the bird, blasting fire and screaming in that awful voice it had.

A quick glance showed him a similar scene with the other feather-slinger bird and another one of the wretched creatures, and the two thunder ones were attempting to fry the living crap out of yet two more of the monsters. They blasted through a stormy sky filled with lightning, fire, and the screams of the monsters. It was a scene straight out of hell.

Ratchet decided right then and there that this was A Place He Didn’t Need to Be, and that he must act accordingly, and quickly. It wasn’t a cowards running, it was a tactical retreat, because there was absolutely no way in pit he was going to make it out of this mess alive if he stayed, and if he wanted to live he better get the hell out of dodge, and quickly. He threw himself to his feet and took off at a run across the top of the butte, aiming for the door at the top of the silo. If he could get inside, he would most likely be safe, he figured. Truth be told, he wasn’t really sure of anything anymore, but he’d take his chances.

The terrified screeching scream stopped him cold-it wasn’t one of the monsters screaming. This scream was the anguished one of a youngling, who was in mortal danger. It was a scream the likes of which Ratchet hadn’t heard since the last days they were on Cybertron, when Megatron had ordered the bombing of one of the last remaining youth centers, where the youngest were slaughtered and the screams of the older ones as they were carried off by the Decepticons still echoed in his audials. The Autobots had arrived too late-the ‘Cons had already made off with the older younglings to indoctrinate as their newest recruits, and the only thing left were the dead and dying.

It was one of the blasted baby birds. A fifth monster had flown in close to the ground, undetected, and had snatched one of the young out of the nest. The baby bird was thrashing and screaming as the monster held it mercilessly in its grip, while the other two cried in terror. It took Ratchet less than two seconds to reach a decision.

 _I’m seriously going to regret this later, if there is a later_ , he thought to himself as he transformed his servos into his blades and charged towards the creature.  
He slammed into the side of it with the force of a locomotive and a mad yell, but it was only enough to barely move the monster sideways more than a couple feet, a mere inconvenience. His blades bounced off its thick hide and slid down the scales with a sound like nails on a chalkboard. It looked at him with a disdainful look as it turned and the raised its wings to prepare for flight. As it looked down at him, its nostrils began to glow brighter with the heat of a miniature sun. Well frag-it was going to fry him, and he knew he wouldn’t make it out of that alive and if he did, he would be completely slagged. Desperately, Ratchet sought a way, any way, to keep himself alive.

There! A bare spot on the monster’s side, under its wing. No scales probably meant no armor there, and it was approximately where most vital organs were on most organics. With a new sense of urgency and purpose, Ratchet threw himself sideways, avoiding the monster’s blast of fire and slammed both of his blades into the monster’s vulnerable side, sending a prayer to Primus as he did so.

The effect was immediate. The monster howled in agony, dropping the baby bird who scuttled away as fast as its uncoordinated legs would carry it to safety. It began to thrash as Ratchet grimly dug his blades even deeper into its side as he tried to avoid being pancaked by a 100 ton monster. One of the blades abruptly snapped off and he jumped away cursing in pain as the monster howled louder and thrashed harder, driving the broken blade in even deeper. With one last scream, it blasted fire at the sky and then collapsed, dying and instantly turning into a cloud of dust. There was a clatter as the broken blade that had embedded itself in the disintegrated monster hit the red sandstone.

The other monsters screamed, and then fled. The adult birds chased after them, and Ratchet abruptly collapsed in front of the nest of baby birds, his legs unable to hold up his weight. He sat there staring at the broken blade in front of him while holding his damaged servo in his good servo, and muttered, “Sweet mother of the Allspark, I never want to do that again.” He continued to sit there staring at the blade, long after the storm that had raged above them stopped and the blistering sun returned. He was jolted out of his shock by the tremors that heralded the return of the large adult birds. And it wasn’t just Toark and Irrla either, it was also the other two large feather-slingers as well.

“Umm..” Ratchet trailed off as both Toark and Irrla abruptly bowed to him, their beaks coming perilously close to scraping the red sandstone they stood upon. “Uhhh..” he said rather unintelligently, unable to think of anything else to say.

“We thank you forrr sssaving ourrrr chicksss,” they both said in unison, “and honorrrr yourrr sacrrrrifce of yourrr hand in theirrrr defensssse. Thessse two Wakinyan arrre foreverrr in yourrr debt.”

The two razor feather-slinging birds both bowed as well, though not as far as the thunder birds. “I, Nacrrr, and mate Arrrctia, of the Achiyalatopa, also honorrrr yourrr courrrage againssst Piassssa,” the smaller male said. The two of them abruptly rose and then flew back to their own nest, no doubt to check on their own chicks.

Toarrk then spoke again. “You everrrr rrrequire ourrr assssissstance, ssspeak ourrrr namesss. One will come to help, no matterrr wherrre you arrrrre.”  
They both then turned back to their chicks, and paid him no more attention. Ratchet shakily gathered up his busted blade and staggered back into the base one handed. He staggered into the main part of the silo, where the rest of the humans and the team were gathered.

“Hey Sunshine, where have you been?” Wheeljack’s cajoling, irritating voice echoed over the general noise of the humans and Agent Fowler’s “discussion” with Prime. Ratchet staggered past, ignoring Wheeljack, focusing only on getting to his quarters. “Oh Doc….Doc? Wait, what the slag happened to your servo?”

Optimus and the rest turned immediately to look at Ratchet, who was sporting energon stains on his chest and right hand where the blade had snapped off and taken several energon lines with it until he had managed to stem the flow. Optimus was immediately at his side, concern in his optics while the rest of the team gathered around making various noises of concern and incredulity, while the humans, mostly Miko and Agent Fowler, loudly demanded to know what had just happened from the gantry above.

“Simple accident….blade snapped off. I’ll fix it tomorrow. Just going to go to my quarters now, need some recharge,” Ratchet managed to mumble.

“Old friend…” Optimus started to say, but Ratchet shoved past him and the others to head further into the base. He slammed the doors to his modest quarters shut and bolted them, before collapsing onto the uncomfortable berth.

“Sweet Primus, how in the frag do I explain this to them tomorrow?”

**Author's Note:**

> A/N-I'm pulling mythical creatures from different tribes that are in America, and not all of them from Nevada or even the southwest. The horned serpents are called Avanyu, from the Hopi and Pueblo tribes (or so the internet says, please correct me if I am wrong because we all know that the internet never lies :)). Thunderbird is pretty self explanatory, I hope.


End file.
